New Delhi: News Nation consulting editor Deepak Chaurasia Thursday shared a morphed image of a sweet shop in Srinagar’s Lal Chowk.
He shared the image of the store, purportedly named “Yadav Misthaan Bhandaar” and owned by “Jai Yadav (Ghaziabad wale)”, from his Twitter handle with the caption: “#PicOfTheYear. While the rest kept thinking, a Yadav Bhai has opened a shop in Kashmir (sic)”.
इधर बाकी लोग सोचते ही रह गए। यादव भाई ने कश्मीर में दुकान खोल ली। वाह ? pic.twitter.com/n7a4YWtbYL
— Deepak Chaurasia (@DChaurasia2312) August 12, 2021
His post was retweeted by over 3,600 people and liked by over 20,000.
Samajwadi Party member Kailash Nath Singh Yadav, a former Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) MP from Chandauli in Uttar Pradesh, also shared the same image with the caption, “Devotees were left wondering, Yadav ji of Ghaziabad opened a sweet shop in Kashmir.#जय_यादव_जय_माधव” (caption translated via Google). His post received over 300 retweets and 1,500 likes.
भक्त सोचते ही रह गए गाजियाबाद वाले यादव जी कश्मीर में मिठाई की दुकान खोल लिए #जय_यादव_जय_माधव pic.twitter.com/7r8GUztdIn
— कैलाश नाथ यादव (@kailashnathsp) August 11, 2021
Several other Twitter users shared the image with the same caption as written by Chaurasia.
इधर बाकी लोग सोचते ही रह गए। यादव भाई ने कश्मीर में दुकान खोल ली। वाह ? pic.twitter.com/YQvlHj1Mjr
— मनीष ब्रह्मर्षि (@Manishbrahmarsh) August 12, 2021
इधर बाकी लोग सोचते ही रह गए। @myogiadityanath बाबा के राज्य के भाई ने कश्मीर में दुकान खोल ली।
वाह भई वाह? pic.twitter.com/sbpbvXh7CO
— Adv Hitesh Malviya (@HiteshK73691058) August 12, 2021
Not from Kashmir
This viral photograph is morphed. The same image had been circulated several times in 2019 with different store names on the banner.
The image first appeared on Facebook on 5 August 2019, when the Narendra Modi government scrapped Article 370. The move paved the way for people outside Jammu and Kashmir to buy property in the erstwhile state.
The store in that first image was named “Jodhpur Misthan Bhandar”. It was shared by a Facebook user called “Barmer – RJ 04” with the caption: “Come on, Kachori-chilli hot hot. A new firm started in Kashmir”.
The very next day, a Twitter user named Amit Lalwani shared the same image but the name of the store had been changed to “Jai Jhulelal Mishthan Bhandar”.
— amit lalwani (@amitlalwani83) August 5, 2019
On 18 August 2019, the image appeared again on Facebook with the store now named “Chandravanshi Mishthaan Bhandar”. The caption read, “We have reached. Jai Chandravanshi (sic) BY-Chandravanshi Samaj Rajasthan, India”.
All these morphed images had one thing in common: The claim that the store was located in Srinagar’s Lal Chowk.
However, in March this year, the Modi government had said that no outsider had bought land in J&K since the scrapping of Article 370.
On Tuesday, Union Minister of State for Home Nityanand Rai informed Lok Sabha that only “two persons from outside Jammu and Kashmir have purchased two properties in the Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir since August 2019”.
In collaboration with SM Hoaxslayer.
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